For years, Susan has experienced the wonder of serendipity in the big city and savors the details of urban life that often elude those rushing through life. She enjoys telling the stories of the sung and the unsung.
At E.A.T. restaurant she loses her appetite but is captivated by an explicit description delivered by a debonair Englishman sitting near her of stalking, killing and cutting off a fox’s tail – his murderer’s trophy.
In Central Park she stumbles upon a marijuana deal and can’t resist interviewing dealer and buyer. She's totally fascinated and sometimes that breeds fearlessness.
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Susan Braudy: Manhattan Voyeur: A Writer’s Journal

I’m Susan Braudy. Writer. Urban Voyeur. Streetwalker.

My beat is Manhattan. Even though I am an insider, this city always surprises.

On Manhattan sidewalks, and even in restaurants, people don’t notice when you cross the line between looking and staring.

When I hit our electric streets, I feel the bingo bam buzz, an instant adventure in thought, sites, sounds, and people coming at me. Models and murderers. Pets and kids. Okay, I’ve admitted I’m a voyeur. I love eavesdropping on intimate conversations in French, English, and a hundred languages I don’t speak. I love to write about New York city and its gems– hidden and in full view.

Even indoors, I am thrilled to look down on Central Park stretching out long like a rain forest as people and cars move in synchronicity.

Living in Manhattan is better than living by Niagara Falls or by the Grand Canyon.

Michael Wolff has been a positive force in my life for thirty-four years.

In the early ’70s I published a beautiful and profound essay by Wolff in Ms. Magazine. Since then he’s helped me collegially more than anyone else. I’ve watched him navigate the murky pools of big-time journalism with awe.

He’s fearless and hugely talented with words. He’s also two steps ahead of the enemy. He writes what people think but are afraid to say. Currently he’s helping me gain courage to reveal my own experience with a red-carpet sleaze.

Wolff’s on the nose with Donald Trump. I know his career intimately: he’s always on the nose. Attacking Michael’s book, Fire and Fury for minor errors hasn’t fooled a soul. White House reporters look sickly green with jealousy on my color TV when they futilely lash out.

Why am I so certain?

In 1986, I went to work for Michael Douglas and had the misfortune to encounter the dread Donald Trump as he elbowed and shoved his way to the front of lines and threw money, private plane rides and other material perks at Douglas blatantly trying to purchase “friendship” with a star.

He made me shudder and back out of rooms. Once he shoved Glenn Close away hard at an awards ceremony so that he could introduce Douglas to the crowd. The frequently bankrupt Trump took 1 million dollars from my friend Charles Allen Jr. with no discussion of paying it back.

I can’t wait to witness Michael Wolff’s crowning on The Late Showwith Stephen Colbert tonight. To survive as a democracy we desperately need more fearless reporters who write brilliantly, stand their ground and make Republicans sweat their asses off.

Since Trump claims Putin didn’t hack our elections and is doing nothing to prevent similar future crimes, we need to mount a campaign. I suggest starting by fighting for reinstating old unhackable machines. We need to get going pronto. How do we start? Photo by John C Abell

If the Russians hacked the last presidential election and finagled things so that Trump won, that’s reason to moot the election. What the hell did the Russians do to our election? If they hacked the election, we should stop using computers in elections at once. Why aren’t the Democrats fighting tooth and nail on this?

Integrity, brains–these have nothing to do with who Americans vote for. We are stupid and bored and yes, corrupt. We vote for the most charismatic, good-looking candidate. We vote for someone who will amuse us when we turn on the TV. I hate Donald Trump, but in small doses and from a distance I suspect…

Am I the only person who is suspicious of Fidel Castro’s final exit from the world stage? Did he really just die right after our presidential election? Or did he mastermind a fake death. How could he have resisted manipulating news of his death? The man is a political genius, out-manoeuvering the U.S. at every…

We’re not bad people. When Hitler started mouthing off, someone brilliant said he was driving the German people crazy. We all contain the possibility of fearing or disliking the other–ie people who are different from us. Trump is driving the American people crazy. I know it will not be permanent. We are not the dirty…